


Hellhounds in the Mines

by Silent_So_Long



Category: Chronicles of Riddick (2004)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-12-16
Updated: 2011-12-16
Packaged: 2017-10-27 09:44:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,419
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/294373
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Silent_So_Long/pseuds/Silent_So_Long
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Riddick and Vaako make their escape from jail, only to face hellhounds on the way.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Hellhounds in the Mines

**Author's Note:**

> written for the tenth round of smallfandomfest

The darkness and silence pressed in upon Riddick, seeming almost to have a weight of its own that bore down upon his shoulders. He continued prowling through the corridors of the underground jail, not letting the all-pervading air of oppressive doom slow him down. Occasionally, guttering candlelight emanating from glass fronted wall sconces caught and sparkled in polished silver eyes, glinting at weird angles and making his predator’s gaze seem almost divorced from his body.

Vaako followed closely in Riddick’s footsteps, trusting the Furyan to lead them from the mines and from the jail cell they’d both left behind. Even though Vaako remained silent on the subject as he remained silent about most things, they both knew that Riddick was the main reason as to why they’d even been jailed in the first place. After all, it had been he who’d killed the Trifectian ambassador, not Vaako. In so killing the ambassador, Riddick had also managed to stop Vaako himself from being killed, Vaako being held responsible for the former Lord Marshal’s digressions upon Trifectia Ceti VII. As Vaako had later explained, while imprisoned, Trifectia had been one of the planets the former Lord Marshal Zhylaw had wiped clean of life, converting those who would submit to the Necromonger way and slaughtering those who rebelled.

It had seemed that Zhylaw’s former genocide upon Trifectia hadn’t completely worked. There had been enough survivors hiding in the mines to rebuild the civilization upon the surface, a fact which had worked against both Riddick and Vaako when they crash-landed upon the surface. As a recognizable Necromonger, and Lord Marshal Zhylaw’s former second in command, it had been at the Trifectian ambassador’s behest that Vaako be killed, once their crashed vessel had been discovered. Vaako knew that he owed Riddick his life, and would owe him their escape if they ever got out of the mines, in one piece.

“Remind me again why the jail had to be deep in the mines?” Riddick’s dry question filtered back towards Vaako.

Vaako knew it was a rhetorical statement, yet answered anyway.

“What better way to make sure prisoners stay imprisoned?” he asked, keeping his voice as hushed as Riddick had done.

Riddick harrumphed but otherwise kept silent. Vaako followed in Riddick’s slow, sure footsteps, as he scanned the darkness around him. While his own senses were not inconsiderable, he knew that Riddick’s far surpassed his own. The Furyan’s sense of smell and eyesight were better than Vaako’s, particularly in the dark. Vaako would never have thought he would trust such a man as Riddick, yet he had come to do so, despite the fact that it was Necromongers like him that had wiped out the Furyan race at the behest of Zhylaw. The fact that Vaako himself had tried to kill Riddick never entered the equation for either of them anymore.

He stole quietly behind Riddick, large frame belying the softness of his tread and he pulled up short when the other man raised one hand, one sharp, quick hiss the only sound that broke the air between them. Vaako listened, ears straining for the noise that Riddick had heard when he hadn’t. Finally he caught the sound, far off growls and barks growing closer with every passing second.

“The hellhounds. They know we’ve escaped,” Riddick ground out, not bothering to keep quiet any longer.

They both knew that when the hellhounds were on one’s trail, then there was a slim chance of survival. Knowing Riddick’s past track record with keeping himself alive against all odds, Vaako knew that the Furyan had a good chance of surviving the hellhounds too.

“Might I suggest we move?” Vaako asked, jabbing the Furyan forward heftily.

Riddick turned a growl onto him yet didn’t react further. If it had been anyone other than Vaako jabbing him and he would have been dead upon the spot, Vaako knew. No one dared to test a Furyan’s fury, especially Riddick, the Alpha Furyan, embodiment of pain and rage. That was what had kept Riddick alive for so long, his rage and his innate ability to fight, to scare and to murder his way out of trouble. It was what Vaako counted upon to also get him out of trouble on more than one occasion.

And so they made their way through dark tunnels, while behind them the hellhounds drew closer. Vaako could almost feel the hounds’ hot breath against the back of his legs, a phantom sense that wasn’t real but easily imagined anyway. He’d heard stories of those hellhounds in the time that he’d been down here; hounds let loose to track potential escapees, none of whom came back alive once the hellhounds got to them nor were ever seen in the known universe again.

It was what made the hellhounds effective guard dogs, released from the hellish suburbs they usually inhabited, through a gate which was purported to be situated somewhere in the mines. It was the main reason why the mines had been abandoned in the first place; no one had wanted to work there next to a doorway into another hellish realm, replete with nightmarish monsters and vicious hellhounds.

All that could be seen of those hellhounds were their eyes, glowing red orbs that floated after escapees, hot breath smoking from between amorphous lips, feet that were unseen yet could carry their owners great distances within seconds. Usually those hounds were silent, prefect predators that were felt before they were seen in most cases. Not so in this case; it was as if the guards had wanted Riddick and Vaako to know they’d been caught missing, as though the noises alone could frighten them. Vaako snorted to himself; fat chance of that happening to either one of them. Both of them, on their own merits had seen enough horrors, had perpetrated even more to outshine even the deadly hellhounds.

Vaako followed as Riddick plunged into a side corridor, stopping just out of range of where the closest guttering candlelight threw its flames. They stood side by side in silence, as the hellhounds came closer, closer, closer still.

Vaako watched as Riddick scented the air, nostrils flaring and eyes shining whenever they managed to catch scant light. Those silver orbs shifted from side to side, taking in every aspect of the corridor surrounding them, as the sounds of pursuing hounds came closer still. Finally, Riddick stepped into the path of the hounds, glowing red eyes greeting him as the invisible amorphous dogs snapped around his heels. Vaako waded in, his blade held high as he started chopping at the dogs, following the scent of their sulphurous breath and their glowing red eyes to cleave bodies in two. Beside him, shoulders touching as they whirled and rent, was Riddick, curved blade also cutting a swathe through the masses of dogs surrounding them.

Vaako took several gashes to where skin was exposed, yet he could feel nothing of his wounds. Instead, he battled on, punching, kicking, slashing at barely seen but surely felt bodies surrounding him. If Vaako thought he fought hard, then Riddick fought harder still, fury channelled through him to wreak vengeance upon the hounds that had stalked them through the mines. The hounds didn’t stand a chance and never had. Soon, there were only Riddick and Vaako left standing. Without a word, they turned and left the scene of the carnage they’d wrought far behind them.

It was night time when they achieved the outside air, air just the wrong side of nippy, snow beginning to whirl down from the unseen sky above in fat white flakes. Riddick shivered slightly, yet Vaako barely moved. He still bore the mark of pain upon his neck, that brand given to him as part of the conversion process to prove that he could bear one pain by creating another. The snow and the hellhound wounds meant little to one such as Vaako, pain compartmentalized deep down where even he didn’t know where it was anymore.

Nearby the guards craft was moored, and Riddick hopped in with a hasty - come on - to Vaako. The Necromonger followed the Furyan as Riddick expertly powered up the craft, lights illuminating the flashing snow outside.

“D’you know how to fly this thing?” Vaako asked, dark eyes scanning the arrays of controls spread before them.

“Nah,” Riddick admitted, with a wry grin at the Necromonger. “It can’t be that hard. I’ve flown other crafts plenty fine.”

When it was Riddick saying it, Vaako could well believe it.


End file.
